


Small Cuts

by claremontpsych



Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Brightwell, Dani Powell - Freeform, Eventual Romance, F/M, Hospitalization, Malcolm Bright - Freeform, Malcolm Bright Gets a Hug, Malcolm Bright Needs a Hug, Malcolm Bright Whump, Stabbing, fluff at the end, malcolm gets stabbed again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-22
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23253568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/claremontpsych/pseuds/claremontpsych
Summary: One thing-- quite possibly the only thing-- Malcolm Bright is bad at is waiting for backup. Well, that and clearing corners before rushing onto a crime scene. He is also, admittedly, quite poor at clearing his corners. And time and time again, Gil reminds him that backup is important if you’re going to blatantly avoid clearing your corners, but Malcolm Bright is also really bad at listening.Maybe he’s bad at more things than he thought.OR, a one shot in which Malcolm gets stabbed, and Dani realizes that maybe (just maybe) she might like him just a little bit more than she once bargained for.
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Ainsley Whitly, Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell, Malcolm Bright & Jessica Whitly, Malcolm Bright/Dani Powell
Comments: 3
Kudos: 62





	Small Cuts

**Author's Note:**

> just so it's out there, the violence isn't super graphic. just a little stabby stab. i just figured i'd tag it in case :)

One thing-- quite possibly the only thing-- Malcolm Bright is bad at waiting for backup. Well, that and clearing corners before rushing onto a crime scene. He is, admittedly, quite poor at clearing his corners. And time and time again, Gil reminds him that backup is important if you’re going to blatantly avoid clearing your corners, but Malcolm Bright is also really bad at listening.

Maybe he’s bad at more things than he thought. 

He realizes this fact an unfortunate half a second too late, bursting onto a crime scene alone after scrounging up a lead at an ungodly hour of the night. He couldn’t sleep, so what else was he to do than flip aimlessly through the case files until it hit him. The case they were on was particularly awful, a serial killer targeting New York’s late night workers-- that is, those who volunteer to work the graveyard shift. So far, all of the victims had been women in their 20s-30s. Reasoning yet to be discovered, of course, but Malcolm established the connection and the killer’s stomping grounds, and at 3:34am, he decided to head out from his apartment and test his theories. Yes, he was aware of the ridiculousness of looking for a graveyard shift killer in the dead middle of the graveyard shift, so as a result he shot a text to Gil. The address to which he was heading, “Graveyard Shift” and a smiley face. He assumed himself safe due to his being a man and whatnot, so he headed out without any other considerations.

He made his way into the building pretty easily. It was a rundown 24-hour shop that hadn’t been open in God knows how long, a rather cliché choice for a serial killer lair. Malcolm knew good and well that Gil likely wasn’t awake now, nor was anyone else on the team, and he knew that now was a time to, y’know, wait for backup. But armed with nothing but his dumb luck, he entered the storage space in the back corner of the building, assuming that to be where the unsub would be hiding. Unfortunately for him, he was correct. He ignored the corner space behind the door and between a couple of old storage racks, glancing around the dimly lit space in front of him. 

His time looking around didn’t last too long, though, as he felt the familiar pain of a knife sliding into his skin. God knows where, at this point. It was vaguely towards his lower back, presumably the kidney or so, and Malcolm screamed out at the sudden stab wound. He fell to his knees, saying a silent prayer of “leave the knife in” on his way down. But Malcolm Bright was never that lucky. The large man behind him chose to withdraw the knife and stab him one more time, roughly the same place, before fleeing the scene. Malcolm made note of the body lying cold on the floor beside him, a woman with a name tag and work uniform on. She fit the profile. Malcolm himself obviously did not-- being a man dressed in the way he dresses? Clearly he didn’t work the graveyard shift, he was just insane enough to embark on this adventure. He knew he was bleeding quite a lot at this point, and he just hoped the team would find him before he inevitably bled out here, across from the woman who was supposedly named Catherine. He was face down, practically licking the floor, with tears streaming down his face and his own blood soaking his clothes and leaking onto the ground beneath him. He tried to approximate the time based on all factors he could consider. He left at 3:34, sharply, and the cab ride from his loft to here had taken about 25 minutes. 4am. He had loitered in the main space of the shop for another 10 or so minutes on his hunt for clues, too, so he sunk a bet on it being 4:15 in the morning. 

Shit. Gil doesn’t wake up until 5 or later, typically, and nobody else knows his location. He attempted to grab his phone, reaching back to find his pocket, but realised that was a lost cause as he lightly brushed over the stab wounds in his back and acknowledged the sheer amount of blood he was losing. That, coupled with the fact that his phone had been knocked out of the aforementioned pocket and was now somewhere on the floor, he decided the only good idea was to focus on the wounds. Pressure, he thought. Put pressure on it. So he attempted to clutch his “never-better” shaky hand, now shaking more than ever, over the profusely bleeding wounds. Obviously, as a result of the tremors, that was nearly useless. It was around then that his consciousness began fading in and out, and he willed himself to stay awake. He knew the wound he had wasn’t fatal if the team could arrive in time to save him, but he also knew that a lack of consciousness at this point in time was a death sentence of its own.

It was around this time that he began hallucinating, too. His father, calling him a coward and telling him just how easy it would be to survive the wound he has if he could just do something about it. That caused Malcolm to make a feeble attempt at standing, which went as you’d assume, before giving up yet again. The pain was excruciating, and he was quite literally laying in his own blood right now. Good job, Malcolm, he thought to himself. You survived fine as an FBI Special Agent, but can’t clear one corner with the NYPD and now you’re going to bleed out on a convenience store floor in the middle of Brooklyn. He sighed, and with a few more minutes of his father’s imaginary presence, he decided he’d rather be unconscious than spend what could be his last moments alive with Martin Whitly.

It was exactly 5:27 when the NYPD Major Crimes Unit-- Gil, Dani and JT, (the latter two of which were awoken by at least 10 calls each from Gil, insisting that Malcolm was in trouble and he needed the backup) busted through the convenience store doors on the hunt for their profiler. It was Dani that found him, as well as his companion, Catherine, on the storage room floor. One look made it obvious that Catherine was gone, so Dani’s attention tunneled onto Malcolm, who was still breathing.

“Bright. Bright. Malcolm! Wake up, talk to me,” She pleaded, hoping he had just enough willpower to return to consciousness on her behalf. “Gil! We need a medic! I found him!”

Gil and JT rushed in at the sound of her yelling, then having to face Malcolm’s actions too. 

“Shit, kid.” Gil sighed, “I take it he’s still alive?”

Dani nodded frantically, her own ice-cold hands then pressing over the still bleeding wounds. Malcolm had likely lost half his body weight in blood before they’d shown up, not that the man weighs that much to begin with. Barely eating does that to you. 

In what moved like a blur, the medics arrived (thank you, JT, for having the smarts to call them in while Gil and Dani attempted to deal with Malcolm on their own) and rushed Malcolm out, hauling him to the hospital as quickly as they could. Gil, as the authority figure present, made it incredibly clear to them: he was to be treated at the hospital nearest to the precinct (so they could all easily go see him if they wished), and that he would NOT be given any sort of sedatives unless absolutely necessary, given his past experiences.

That latter was easier said than done. Malcolm required several things upon making it to the hospital. First: emergency surgery on his left kidney to take care of the internal bleeding. Second, blood transfusions-- several. Third, a significant amount of IV fluids, both to hydrate Malcolm, who survives solely on sparkling water and his good looks, and also to reduce his pain. He was no stranger to healing from stab wounds, so when he inevitably came to, he would surely be expecting all of these things. Less characteristic for Malcolm, though, is the fact that they had to put him under anaesthesia to actually complete the procedure, and they frankly didn’t know when he would wake up. Essentially, he had found himself into a bit of a coma. Gil crossed his fingers that the kid would be fine and not wake up from a night terror and rip a stitch. Both Gil and JT left once Ainsley and Jessica arrived, but nobody could convince Detective Dani Powell to leave the hospital. That is, of course, until she realized that she didn’t have the funds to sit in the hospital and not work. She had burned the first handful of hours of her shift waiting for Malcolm to wake up, but then trudged herself back to the precinct.

Gil immediately called her into his office and made a deal with her. Until he was awake and they were certain that he was fine, Dani would be paid to keep watch on him at the hospital. She assured him that it was only because he’s her partner, that she has to make sure he recovers. Gil shut that idea down as soon as she even tried it.

“Dani, you and I both know I’m not that dumb. You love the kid. You haven’t looked at anybody the way you look at Bright since, God, I met you.” He snickered, lightheartedly hinting at her time in narcotics and the relationship she had while undercover.

She sighed, “I’m sorry. Thank you for this, for everything really. I guess I’ll go back to the hospital then.”

And that’s what she did. Gil would text her updates on the case, and she would provide her expert eye to the situation from the chair on the right side of Malcolm’s bed. She even brought a copy of the case files so she could continue business (mostly) as usual until Malcolm came to. A fair deal. 

It took Malcolm exactly one day and three hours to wake up. Likely the most sleep he’d gotten since he was 10 years old. Dani was the first person to see him, and she immediately texted the team, and told Gil to contact Jessica as well.

When his eyes finally cracked open, he blinked thrice, groaned twice, and instantly winced from the still rather fresh wounds in his back. 

“Mornin’, Sunshine,” Dani snickered at him, secretly very glad to see he was awake.

“Dani?” He questioned. He was expecting a lot of people. Gil, his mother, his sister, but not Dani.

She nodded, “In the flesh. I’ve been pulling your weight and consulting from your bedside while we waited for your ass to finally wake up.”

“What happened? I remember getting stabbed but that’s it,” he asked, “and how long was I out for?”

Dani explained what she knew before the doctors and nurses came in to give him a once-over now that he was awake, and to more accurately describe the condition he has found himself in. Immediately following that, Gil and JT showed up, and Jessica and Ainsley followed them. Dani saw herself out for tea to allow them all some time with him, figuring she’ll just come back and see him again afterwards. She also decided to change her clothes during her free time, as Gil had brought her the overnight bag she always keeps at the precinct.

Once everyone saw themselves out, Dani promised to be back to the precinct by lunch, so long as Gil gave her the chance to really talk to Malcolm now. She had a lot to say. Of course, Gil more than happily obliged the request. Lunch and no later, they agreed, and she re-entered Malcolm’s room with a hot cup of Earl Grey in her hand. 

“You fine enough that we can talk?” Dani checked. Malcolm just nodded.

“I’m in a lot of pain, but one would expect that given the situation.” He half-heartedly joked. She gave him a courtesy laugh.

First, she scolded/yelled at/nearly cried to him, drilling it in that he absolutely needs to wait for backup. And for the love of Christ, she begged, let her teach him to better clear his corners. He agreed, so long as they let him out of the hospital in time. 

Second, she told him how scary it was to wake up to Gil’s panicked calls, not even knowing if he was still alive. She made him promise to never do it again. She trusted him when he agreed.

Third, she mustered up the courage to say

“Bright, I like you a lot, okay. More than most people at least, and not in a friends kind of way.”

To which he replied with “Let me heal this kidney and then I’ll treat you to dinner. A date, and an apology. I like you a lot, too, Dani, and I’m sorry that this certainly isn’t the romantic declaration of my feelings that you deserved to have.”

She agreed to the dinner date. He beckoned her over, and he weakly grabbed her hand (being that he had an IV dripping into his elbow, his grip wasn’t what it usually is), brought it to his lips and gently kissed her knuckles. It was a tender act, and Dani found herself thinking about it as she walked back to the precinct that afternoon.

They found the guy that night, and Dani was the one to put him in cuffs. She was the one to interrogate him, and she was the one to get his confession. 

Malcolm got out of the hospital a few days later, and he maintained his being well enough to take her out to dinner that very weekend. He was weak, but he managed in his stubborn and Malcolmly way to make it the best date she’s ever been on. 

He promised her that these stab wounds were nothing, only small cuts.

**Author's Note:**

> So! That's that. A little Whumpy sumn sumn to spice up ur day/night/whenever it is you're reading this. Hope you enjoyed! The title is inspired by "Small Cuts" by the Brobecks, by the way!
> 
> I'm also on tumblr, same url as on here :)
> 
> Don't forget to leave comments/Kudos!


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